Background In the setting of the opioid crisis, managing postoperative pain without the exclusive use of opiates has become a topic of interest. Many hospitals have begun implementing enhanced recovery after surgery protocols to decrease postoperative complications, hospital costs, and opiate utilization. Ketorolac has been added to many of these protocols, but few studies have examined its effects independently. Methods A retrospective chart review was performed on all patients that received autologous breast reconstruction from October 2020 to June 2022 at an academic institution. We identified patients who did and did not receive postoperative ketorolac. Use of ketorolac was based upon surgeon preference. The two groups were compared in basic demographics, reconstruction characteristics, length of stay, complications, reoperations, and morphine milligram equivalents (MMEs). Results One-hundred ten patients were included for the analysis, with 55 receiving scheduled postoperative ketorolac and 55 who did not receive ketorolac. There were seven incidences of postoperative complications in each group (12.7%, p = 1.00). The total mean postoperative MMEs were 344.7 for the nonketorolac group and 336.5 for the ketorolac group (p = 0.81). No variable was found to be independently associated with postoperative opiate use. Ketorolac was not found to contribute significantly to any postoperative complication. Conclusion In this study, the use of ketorolac did not significantly reduce opiate use in a cohort of 110 patients. Surgeons should consider whether the use of ketorolac alone is the best option to reduce postoperative opiate use following free flap breast reconstruction.

Background: Abdominoplasty has consistently been one of the top cosmetic procedures performed each year with a high patient satisfaction rate. Excision of the excess abdominal skin has been shown to reduce low back pain and improve posture. The effects of the excess skin removal would, theoretically, be demonstrated through changes in gait. This study aimed to measure kinematic differences during gait to obtain objective measures for abdominoplasty. Methods: Subjects were recruited from a large, academic plastic surgery clinic. Patients were included if they were 18 years of age, able to walk without an assistive device or any hindrance by any existing medical condition, and were scheduled for abdominoplasty. Kinematic measurements were taken before and after surgery using a plug-in-gait marker set, cameras, and a treadmill. Pre-and postoperative measurements were compared and a post-hoc power analysis was created. Results: Nine total patients were included in the study. Joint angles before and after surgery demonstrated moderate differences. However, analysis revealed few significant differences for spatiotemporal or kinematic variables. The power analysis demonstrated an inadequate number of patients to detect significance. Conclusions: Despite the literature describing subjective and objective improvements following abdominoplasty, we were unable to validate this. Overall, there were noticeable differences in joint angles pre-and postoperatively, though the study is too underpowered to reach statistical significance. This preliminary data shows that if the study was powered through a larger cohort, then more generalizable conclusions could be drawn.

Background The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) global pandemic prompted an unprecedented contraction in surgical volume. This utilizes the American College of Surgeons' National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (NSQIP) database to assess the impact of COVID-19 on breast reconstruction surgery volume and quality throughout 2020. Methods The NSQIP database was utilized to gather data from 2015 to 2020. We provide descriptive statistics in the form of mean (standard deviation), median (interquartile range), and range for continuous variables and counts (%) for categorical variables. A Kruskal–Wallis test was used to compare average age and a chi-squared test was used to compare other demographic categorical variables from 2019 to 2020. Results Breast reconstruction procedures decreased by 27% in Q2 2020 compared to Q2 of 2019. Immediate tissue-expander-based reconstruction was the only type of reconstruction that increased in comparison to Q2 2019 values (53.5 vs. 41.1%, p < 0.001). Rates of delayed direct to implant reconstruction was decreased (12.8 vs. 17.5%, p < 0.001) and free flap-based breast reconstruction decreased, including immediate free flap reconstruction (5.3 vs. 9%, p < 0.001) and delayed free flap reconstruction (5.7 vs. 9.1%, p < 0.001). Immediate direct to implant reconstruction rates were unchanged. In terms of surgical quality, there were no statistically significant increases in postoperative complications, readmissions, or reoperations. Conclusion Breast reconstruction surgery was heavily impacted in Q2 of 2020 with a 27% decrease in total surgical volume. There was an increase in immediate tissue-expander-based reconstruction and decrease in rates of both direct to implant and free-flap based reconstruction. Surgical quality and outcomes remained unchanged through the pandemic.